A Blog

Seroxat Suicide Bomb

There main reason that I am sceptical of psychiatry and the pharmaceutical
industry is
that we have very little good understanding of how the
brain works and what effects different
chemicals have on its
functioning. And don't get me started on the placebo
effect.

All over the BBC
today is the news that GlaxoSmithKline has apparently been caught
covering up the ineffectiveness of its antidepressant
Seroxat, for adolescent
depression. An extract:

She also found an email from a public relations executive working
for GSK which said: "Originally we had planned to do extensive media
relations surrounding this study until we actually viewed the
results. "Essentially the study did not really show it was effective
in treating adolescent depression, which is not something we want to
publicise."

The editor in chief of the British Medical Journal, Fiona Godlee,
said that what she calls the "blind-eye culture of medicine" should
be exposed by professionals.

When pharmaceutical companies spend huge amounts of money developing and
promoting a drug, it
is understandable that they are willing to suppress studies which
undermine their agenda. How else are they going to make back the money they
have already spent, if not through peddling their wares to as many as
possible? But it is your own responsibility to ensure that you are not
being taken advantage of by people who think they know better, or
consider those who aren't helped by their drugs as a kind of collateral
damage. People may be trying to help, but this really still is the blind
leading the blind.